


The Hawk on the Shelf

by epeeblade



Category: The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Action Figures, Character Death Fix, Christmas, Coulson Lives, Crack, Fix-It, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-30
Updated: 2012-12-30
Packaged: 2017-11-22 22:37:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,640
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/615131
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/epeeblade/pseuds/epeeblade
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Phil's Hawkeye action figure comes to life.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Hawk on the Shelf

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to Lapillus for the beta.
> 
> Inspired by getting my own Hawkeye figure for Christmas;)

Clint woke up with a great gasp, his lungs filling as if it was the first time he'd ever taken a breath. He stumbled and reflexively went into a crouch, despite the stiffness in his limbs. With instincts honed on countless missions, he quickly took in his surroundings – and then shook his head, because what he saw didn't make any sense.

He was up high –of course – but the ledge overlooked what appeared to be a giant room. The door stretched the height of a building, and the armchair and table in the center looked like the rounded curves of a city. Dim light filtered through a curtained window opposite him, but it stretched an impossible distance away.

Something was seriously fucked up right now. Clint did what he always did – reach for his bow. With his other hand he reached for an arrow out of his quiver, but just as he realized the bow wasn't strung, Clint found he couldn't pull out an arrow either. 

He swung around the quiver, and saw the shafts were stuck in something dark and solid, some sort of plastic resin. How the hell had that happened? 

Clint dropped the quiver when he caught sight of his own hands. They gleamed in the light – just like plastic.

"No way." He whirled around to get a good look of what was behind him. There stood the rest of the Avengers – all frozen in poses. When he walked up to Natasha, he couldn't help but grab her by the shoulders and shake. "Nat!"

But the action only caused her to tumble off the stand holding her in place, and she clattered to the ground. Whatever magic had done this to him, it hadn't brought the rest of his team with it.

He backed away, and right into a shiny plastic box. Behind that shield he saw his own face, empty, lifeless, staring right back at him. 

Instead of panic, Clint only felt relief. He knew exactly where he was. Only one person he knew bought two sets of action figures – one to keep in the box, the other to play with. For a moment, a memory filtered through his mind – Phil's hands on him, around him, that voice reassuring him in low tones.

Clint was in Phil's display room. Now the only challenge was in getting out and finding Phil. Coulson could fix this.

***

Phil pulled a throw over his shoulders, still cold despite the sweater. The rain clattering against his windows didn't help. Shouldn't it at least have the decency to snow on Christmas Eve? 

He used to have better stamina than this. There were ops where he'd braved blizzards in nothing more than his suit jacket. Although he'd had his cold weather kit at the time – Phil remembered handing over his coat to Clint who'd forgone his to get the ideal perch.

Christ, every thought brought him back to Clint these days. 

His phone sat silent on the coffee table, and every time Phil looked at it his fingers twitched. No, Clint had to make the first move, just like when they first gotten together. He's the one who'd grieved, who'd gotten over Phil who was supposed to have been dead. 

Coming back to life should have been a good thing. But nights like tonight – lonely and cold, with the ache running deep from his shoulder to his sternum – made Phil reconsider. 

The noise coming from his toy room had Phil springing to his feet, hands reaching for a sidearm that wasn't there. He hadn't requalified on it yet, so it was safely locked away under his bed. His heart thumped rapidly, and Phil made a concerted effort to quiet it. The security on his apartment was some of the best – Shield approved and Stark enhanced. Nothing could have gotten in without him knowing. 

It had to be the damn cat getting in there again. 

At the uncharitable thought, Isis meowed from across the room. Her ears were alert and she was looked at the closed door. She'd heard it too. 

Phil picked up the heavy glass paperweight he kept just for these sorts of emergencies. It would pack quite the punch, even with his weakened arm strength. He crept across the carpet, not making a sound until throwing the door open. "Freeze!" He flipped on the lights and used the door as cover only to be met with an empty room.

His Avengers figures had been disturbed. The Black Widow figure had toppled over and the Hawkeye one was nowhere to be found. But there was no one else in the room. Phil checked quickly behind the armchair and made sure the windows were still latched. He was still alone.

"Phil."

He whirled. That was Clint's voice – small and far away, but unmistakable. Phil looked up, wondering if Clint had gotten into the ventilation system of his building.

"Down here. You almost clocked me with the door."

There was his Hawkeye action figure – walking across the room, and talking with Clint's voice. Phil slid to the floor, his heart ratcheting a crescendo now. This was probably one of those situations he probably was supposed to avoid until his meds were stabilized. 

Then his rational mind kicked in, and Phil mentally reviewed the last few missions the Avengers had been on. He'd still maintained his security clearance, even if he was inactive at the moment. Nothing in his memory could have caused this.

"Barton?"

Miniature Clint shrugged and gestured with his little plastic bow. "It's me in the plastic flesh."

Phil crouched down to get a better look. That was the Hawkeye figure he'd spent so much time talking to – practicing all the things he'd say to Clint if he could. It was odd to see him move – and not just where his joints were articulated. Right now the little face wore a familiar expression – and not the scowl the plastic had originally been molded into.

"Sir, are you all right? You're wearing a sweater."

Phil grinned at the scandalized tone. Even when he and Clint were sleeping together, it had been rare for Phil to be out of 'uniform.' Either naked or in a suit – that pretty much summed up their relationship.

"It's cold." The smile faded. Those words summed up so much of the past few months, not just the chill that hadn't faded since his injury.

Isis chose that moment to investigate the new toy. She pounced from the doorway and had miniClint under one paw.

"Damnit, cat, I'm not a mouse." Clint's words were muffled.

She ignored him and rubbed her jaw against him. Phil bit his lip to keep from laughing before shooing the cat away. He carefully picked Clint up to avoid any more misunderstandings. The figure was warm, as if he really held a tiny body in his hands. 

"I'll lock her in the bedroom until we get this figured out." Phil deposited Clint on the kitchen counter before scooping up Isis and getting her squared away. He pulled out her catnip mouse – meant to be a Christmas present – and set her down with it. At least this way she wouldn't be meowing and scratching at the door. 

When he got back to the kitchen, Clint had found Phil's toothpicks and was fashioning arrows out of them. Phil gave in to laughter this time.

Clint pouted. "My quiver is full of fake arrows. I need something to defend myself."

Phil picked up one of the toothpicks. "Against what? My cat?"

"Whatever did this to me." Clint sat on the edge of the counter, kicking his feet out. 

That was the problem. As far as Phil knew, the Avengers were on stand down for Christmas. Stark was hosting some kind of party – Phil had even gotten an invitation, but he'd turned it down. He'd had enough of awkwardly standing in the same room as Clint and neither one of them speaking to each other. 

However, now that Clint was pint-sized, he didn't seem to have any problems talking to Phil. "What's the last thing you remember?"

Clint opened his mouth, and closed it again. "You, your voice. I don't even know what op I was supposed to be on."

Phil sorted through his cabinets until he found his stash of cocoa. The holes in Clint's memory were worrisome. "Do you remember I'm not your handler anymore?"

Clint didn't say anything. He continued to watch as Phil got out the milk and started heating it. "You got a cup small enough for me?"

"Maybe." One of his tree ornaments was a little figure of Santa holding an empty glass, presumably of milk. The one time he'd had Clint's help in trimming the tree, Hawkeye had commented that Santa was probably guzzling whiskey when no one was looking. Phil pried the little cup out of Santa's hand, the old glue giving away easily. 

"You've got to be kidding me." Clint laughed.

That sound did something to Phil. It had been so long since he'd heard it – since Clint had cracked a bad joke in his presence, or teased Phil about his trading cards. No, now Clint would never dare bring up Phil's obsession, if they ever spoke for more than a few minutes. 

"I'd offer you something stronger than hot chocolate, but I haven't gotten anything." No alcohol for Phil, not while he was still on a drug cocktail. It was a small price to pay for living.

"How am I even supposed to pee like this?" Clint flicked at his belt. "I'm pretty sure I'm plastic all the way down."

Phil stirred the milk to cover his disconcertment at the thought of Clint below the waist. Right now with Clint so tiny that would be extremely awkward. "I'll give Sitwell a call. He might know what's going on. At least we can let the rest of the Avengers know where you are."

"It doesn't make sense. How come I woke up in your little Avenger shrine and nobody else did?" Clint eyed the cup into which Phil had poured some drops of hot cocoa. 

"Maybe because I wanted you to. At least now you're talking to me." Phil heard the bitterness in his voice, but didn't regret it. 

"Phil?" Clint put down the cup and made his way across the slippery countertop to lean on Phil's wrist. "What do you mean?"

Phil carefully stroked Clint's hair with his other hand, surprised when instead of plastic, he felt something fuzzy. Was Clint becoming more real as time passed? "Well, now you can't exactly walk out of the room just because I'm in it."

Silence had stretched between them since that day Fury had called the Avengers to a special meeting in a private hospital room. There he'd revealed Phil hadn't been quite as dead as reported. Clint had stayed in the doorway, and Phil couldn't read the expression in those haunted blue eyes. 

It wasn't like either of them could speak then. No one knew they were anything more than handler and asset. Then it just got easier not to talk, to hide, to avoid the emptiness between them.

"Phil." Clint looked confused. "I only remember not being able to answer."

At first that made sense. Of course Clint couldn't respond when Phil suddenly returned to life. But then a sneaking suspicion began to cross Phil's mind. 

"Did you hear that?" Clint pushed himself off of Phil's wrist, and Phil found himself missing the light weight. "In the hall."

Yes, Phil definitely did. He glanced at the clock on the microwave. What would someone want outside his door at 1 am? "The security system should have caught it."

"Not if they're good. Put me in the tree." Clint had gathered up his toothpick arrows. 

"What?"

"It's a decent perch. Good camouflage. Perfect height."

Phil stopped arguing and picked up mini Clint. He deposited him in the garland bedecked branches just as the knob of his door started to twist. Blood thrummed in his ears. Phil dove behind the couch for cover.

"Coulson? Phil?" It couldn't be. Full-size Clint walked into the room. "Ow, god damn it!" He swiped at his cheek.

Apparently toothpick arrows hurt. Phil still didn't know where mini Clint had gotten the string for his plastic bow.

"What the hell?" Clint stalked over to the tree and glared. 

"Oh, you have got to fucking kidding me." Tiny Clint balanced on a bobbing branch holding a shiny red ornament and glared back.

Phil left the cover of the couch and shut his front door. Clint used to be more subtle about breaking in. "You don't seem surprised to see an eight inch version of yourself." 

Clint froze. He backed away from the tree and met Phil's gaze. There were shadows in his eyes, and Phil yearned to brush his fingers across those dark circles. "We had a feeling this might happen."

"We?"

Clint unzipped his jacket and pulled something from the inside pocket. Phil stepped forward, enthralled by the sight of himself rendered in miniature form. The action figure had every detail correct, from the designer suit, to his slightly receding hair line. 

"Good evening, Agent Coulson. Sorry to bother you this evening," Mini Coulson said.

Phil didn't know what to say at first. "There isn't a Shield Agent figure in the Avengers Line." 

Clint laughed. "Figured you'd pick up on that."

Well, of course. Phil knew his collectables. He'd snapped up every bit of Avengers merchandise as soon as it came on the market. His real pride and joy were the figurines. It made him feel close to the team, even during his exile. 

"There's this guy on the internet. Does custom figures if you send him photos." Clint set down Agent Coulson on the coffee table. "I've had him for a few months. Around midnight he started chatting."

Phil did the math and figured that was the same time his own Clint came to life. He reached out and offered him a hand out of the tree. "You had a custom figure made in my likeness?" 

"Fuck, Coulson, you don't get to judge me. Not when you've got mini-me sniping from your Christmas tree!"

Mini Clint crouched in Phil's palm. He looked dejected. "So I've always been an action figure?"

Phil set him down next to Agent Coulson and the two figures stared at each other. "It looks that way. What do you think? Magic?"

Agent Coulson shrugged. "My personal theory is that each of you spent so much time wishing we could talk back, that one day we just did."

"We velveteen rabbited them to life." Clint sounded almost gleeful.

"Did you just use 'velveteen rabbit' as a verb?" Phil rubbed the bridge of his nose. "Nobody thinks this might have something to do with us having more exposure to tesseract energy?"

"It wasn't exactly in the manual." Clint scratched his head. 

Agent Coulson and mini Clint looked at each other. Finally Coulson nodded and little Clint looked up at Phil. "You've spent a lot of time talking to me. I think you need to say some of those things to him. Come on, Phil. Let's give them some privacy."

And the two action figures slid off the table and disappeared into the legs of Phil's furniture. 

"I don't even want to know what they're doing. Fuck, does the plastic even come off?" Clint looked horrified.

Phil's lips twitched. His mirth disappeared as quickly as it had arrived. There was so much between them and he had no idea where to start. "I miss you."

"Christ, Phil. I don't know how you can stand to look at me. After what I did…"

Clint's words made Phil realize something and he could see with a clarity he hadn't been able to before. He'd thought Clint was angry with him. Fury had kept Phil 'dead' for a good month after the invasion. It had taken that long to ensure Phil would even make it. But Phil could see the guilt rolling off Clint in waves.

They'd both been idiots. Phil crossed the distance between them and cupped Clint's face between his hands. "I'm damn sure I can't be the first person to tell you it wasn't your fault. Mind control doesn't work that way."

"Phil, you almost died because of me."

"But I didn't. I'm right here." He took Clint's hand and placed it over his beating heart. It might need some work, but it was still ticking along. "And I'm not letting you out of my sight again."

Clint smirked. "Might make it a little hard to go on missions."

"They'll adapt." Phil decided they'd talked enough. He leaned forward and kissed Clint. Those familiar lips parted for him, and the taste flooded his senses. It was like coming home – no, like coming to life in a way he hadn't been since Loki's blade pierced his chest.

Clint moaned. His hands found their way under Phil's sweater. Phil pushed Clint's coat off his arms, and somehow they both tumbled onto the couch. "Phil, your chest." Clint startled away.

Phil grabbed him and pulled him back down. "It's fine. I've been cleared for sex."

Laugher pealed through the room, and Phil was pretty sure it wasn't just Clint's. "Missed you too."

"Mmm." Phil hummed and enjoyed the feel of Clint's weight on him. 

"What – what can I do for you?" Clint pulled back slightly and his eyes searched Phil's.

There was only one thing Phil wanted – Clint's hands on him, all over him. "Touch me."

Clint grinned. They melded together, legs tangled together and hips slotted against each other, because their bodies hadn't forgotten this. Phil arched up into Clint's sure, strong fingers. He didn't have much stamina these days, but it was going to be okay. They were going to have plenty of time together.

***

"Are they seriously going to do it on the couch? There's a perfectly good bed about twenty feet away." Clint climbed onto a carved sheep that was part of Coulson's nativity scene. Never let it be said that the man didn't go all out.

"I'm pretty sure what you're doing is sacrilegious."

"Hey, I haven't kicked baby Jesus out of the manger." Clint grinned at Phil. Just seeing the man – his size – set his plastic heart a fluttering. Right now he had a heart too. Ever since he'd woken up he'd felt himself thawing for lack of a better word for it. His plastic clothes had even become stiff fabric. 

Phil smiled. "Only a matter of time."

"You know, that straw looks mighty comfy. There's some room in the stable."

"Agent Barton – are you propositioning me?" 

Clint hopped off his sheep and went to entwine his fingers with Phil's. "How often are we going to get this chance, huh? I woke up alone, and my first thought was to look for you."

"You had the big version of me." Phil's face softened. "I'm here now."

"Yeah." Clint pressed their lips together. "Merry Christmas, Phil."

***

Phil woke to Clint burrowing further against his chest. He winced. Though the wound had healed, his back was not going to forgive him for falling asleep on the couch. They were both sticky and sweaty as well. It didn't matter. Phil wouldn't trade this for anything.

"Hey." He shook Clint awake, smiling at the adorable sleepy look on his face. "I've got a perfectly good bed we can sleep away the morning in."

Clint pushed himself up and tugged Phil off the bed. His hair stuck up in all directions, and Phil gave into the urge to run his fingers through it. Ducking his head, Clint chuckled and made for the bedroom door. As soon as he opened it, Isis darted out, nearly tripping him.

"Damn it, Coulson, when did you get a cat?" Clint jumped out of the way.

"Therapist suggested a companion animal." Phil shrugged off the sympathetic look Clint shot him. "Cats are pretty low maintenance. She's probably hungry."

But Isis hadn't gone for her food bowl. She'd dived on something under the tree and it was only then that Phil remembered the action figure versions of himself and Clint. He rushed over and pulled Isis away from the Nativity Scene she'd scattered. Beneath her paws he found both figures entwined in each other's arms, and only plastic once more.

"Are they dead?" Clint said in a hushed tone.

Phil picked them up carefully. He didn't even try to separate them. "I think – they accomplished their purpose. There's a legend about midnight at Christmas Eve, you know."

"That's about animals, and it's bullshit." Clint took the figures from Phil. "What are we going to do with them?"

"I'll give them a private shelf in my collection room. I think they belong together though." Phil swallowed.

"I think so, too." Clint grinned. "Come on."

Clint led the way to the display room, not even teasing Phil about the replica of Captain America's shield on one wall. Phil had one empty shelf, just above the Avengers, that he'd been saving for a future series of figures. He thought it would do for little Clint and Phil.

"You don't think…" Clint said after a moment. "It's like Toy Story? You close the door and all of these guys come alive?"

Well now that was another thing that was going to give Phil nightmares for the next few weeks. "I think we're going to go grab a shower, and then hit the diner downstairs for some Christmas breakfast." 

"And then come back up and have some more sex?" Clint was so hopeful.

"Maybe."

"Maybe? Phil, seriously, come on…"

Phil propelled him out of the room, giving one last glance at the two figures curled up on their own shelf. He swore he saw Coulson wink at him.


End file.
